AIBU to think working for a tiny business might be more hassle than it’s worth?

[thelonelyones]

I’m currently interviewing with a small social enterprise — only 5 staff in total. Salary is decent, but I’ve got doubts.
At the first interview they agreed to send me the questions in advance (reasonable adjustment), but then deviated on the day which completely undermined it. One of the founders also seemed unprepared and had barely looked at my CV. It didn’t fill me with confidence.
For context, I have six disabilities and sometimes need clear processes and consistency to perform at my best. I can absolutely do the role (and have in bigger organisations), but it made me wonder if such a small set-up has the capacity to support people properly.
They also don’t seem to offer much in the way of non-salary benefits. I assume there will be a pension, as that’s a legal requirement, but nothing about it or any other benefits was mentioned in the advert or conversation. They do pay above the Real Living Wage, which is something.
At the same time, I’ve got a third interview with a much larger company coming up. That’s the role I’d really like — £20k more and more structure — but of course there’s no guarantee I’ll get it.
So I’m weighing it up. On one hand, small organisations can mean more variety, autonomy and flexibility. On the other, there’s less HR support, things feel more ad-hoc, and problems can come down to personalities.
AIBU to think I might be better off holding out for something bigger/safer? Or do people actually prefer working in very small teams? Would love to hear others’ experiences of the pros and cons of working for a tiny business.

forgot to add, I can't see any glassdoor reviews, probably as they are so small

I wouldn't im disabled and only work in bigger companies as I need a lot of time of so my shifts can be covered easier when there is more staff

What are their accounts like?

I stopped working for tiny businesses because the owners universally took money out of the business leaving us in a terrible state. It became so stressful I couldn’t carry on.

If they’re solvent, have good working practices and decent governance then I’d consider it.

I wouldn't, no. I worked briefly for a tiny charity when i was fresh out of uni and it was just me and one much older lady in the office, pre covid so no wfh days, and she'd been there forever. She had various health issues which affected her mood and was just routinely vile all the time, would fly off the handle and yell for no reason. It was so shit I only lasted a few weeks. Its put me off small organisations ever since. In my opinion you need a broad range of personalities to keep things balanced and professional.

My DH works for a very small company, about a dozen employees. I work for a company with 30,000 UK employees, and nearly 400,000 worldwide, so between us we are at both ends of the spectrum.

There are positives and negatives to both, and I wouldn’t automatically rule out a small company based on size, but I think there’s more scope for things to go wrong for you in a very small company. I feel like with a small company, you are a lot more screwed if the manager if a dick, for example - it’s pretty easy for me to move internally, for a permanent move or a short term secondment. But if it’s a good small company, you might benefit from more flexibility because it might be less rigid, with fewer pointless policies (DH is sometimes astounded by the beaurocracy I have).

I’m currently going through occupational health for a reasonable adjustment, and there’s a process for this at my company. If DH needed to do this, I doubt his company would know what they were doing - as an example, they paid him full pay on paternity leave because they’d never had anyone go on it before, didn’t have a policy, and couldn’t really be bothered to mess around with payroll info for such a short time. That benefitted him at the time, but their relaxed attitude might not always work out that way.

good idea about checking their accounts but what would I look for? What would be a green / red flag?

Small business owners often think they can make employment up as they go along to sit themselves, & your only recourse if they do that is a stressful tribunal process. In your situation wouldn't do it OP.

I wouldn’t generally speaking. When companies make adjustments for staff the rest of the workforce pickup the rest in small workforce adjustments can be difficult

Honestly as someone working in a very small business I'd tend to agree. We don't offer additional non-pay benefits, including enhanced sick leave, and while we absolutely do make reasonable adjustments as we should, due to the nature of our work and the fact that every role stands by itself some adjustments have had a much greater impact on the rest of the team as a result which means a lot of time spent balancing 'why do I have to do XYZ when this person doesn't' 'how come X gets to do this when I don't' in a small team which obviously isn't fun for the person who's having adjustments made when they ask these questions out loud - even in jest. Recently we had someone ask if they could WFH permanently for health reasons, I said yes except for an important meeting once a month which they still come in for, last time they were in I overheard a couple of people joking 'oh you've decided to show up' and then a number of other people pushing to be allowed to WFH permanently (which wouldn't be ideal for the business, we're only allowing it for this person due to their health). At a larger firm I think these things are less obvious/feel less personal.

They probably file abbreviated accounts so
a bit trickier but look for:

Cash at bank and debtors - this will show how much money the actually have vs money that needs to be collected.

Creditors - do they owe a lot?

Net assets? Do they HAVE more overall than they owe?

Look at equity - if it’s gone up vs prior year they’ve made a profit.

Look at a few years to see if they have made profit/loss consistently.

To be honest I would probably ask for a copy of the unabridged accounts or at least their cash flow (but I'm an accountant). Yes they might not fancy you seeing it but if I was a small business owner I'd understand why you would be nervous.

You could at least ask questions about turnover and cash flow I think, even if they don't want to show you the accounts.

The trouble with equity is that if they take out as much as they make in profit it might not move year on year. What I definitely wouldn't want to see is equity going down year on year.

I’ve noticed from their accounts they’re heavily grant-reliant and had a drop in income last year, but still made a small profit.